Financial Times Discovers Wealth Taxes Exist, After Decades of Inequality
The Financial Times, ever vigilant, notes wealth taxes are 'back in the spotlight.' This, they report, is a decade after Thomas Piketty's work. What's not spotlighted? The preceding decades where the global 1% hoarded trillions, often untaxed, while public services withered. It's a miracle they've noticed now, just as the system seems poised to buckle. The problem wasn't a lack of awareness; it
was a lack of political will, shielded by narratives from—you guessed it—outlets like the FT. One might wonder if 'spotlight' means 'finally unavoidable,' given that Oxfam reported in January 2024 that the five richest men doubled their wealth since 2020, while 5 billion people got poorer. But sure, let's frame it as an intellectual 'return' rather than a desperate, overdue necessity. Perhaps if
the FT had focused on this before the pitchforks were being sharpened, we wouldn't need a national conversation about taxing wealth; we'd just have a functioning society.